Carmakers must tell buyers about "black boxes"

[rs]

This has been in the news a lot lately. It is a limited hangout in my opinion (see below).

By John Crawley Tue Aug 22, 9:28 AM ET

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The government will not require recorders in autos but said on Monday that car makers must tell consumers when technology that tracks speed, braking and other measurements is in the new vehicles they buy.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration regulation standardizes recorder content and sets guidelines for how the information should be disclosed. It also requires recorders to be more durable.

Privacy experts complained that consumer interests are not fully protected and information captured by recorders can be exploited.

Safety experts, consumer groups and insurance companies have long pressed the agency to mandate recorders in cars, but industry has responded voluntarily in recent years. About two-thirds of the new vehicles now produced each year contain the device that is connected to air bag systems. General Motors (NYSE:GM - news) equips all its vehicles with recorders, a company spokesman said.

Regulators sought on Monday to set basic standards for their use, saying that uniform safety data will help make future auto safety regulation more precise.

Automakers have until September 1, 2010, to comply with the notification and other requirements in the new regulation, if they choose to equip their vehicles with recorders.

The rules governing auto recorders, which are similar to the "black boxes" that store information about mechanical flight systems on commercial airliners, are intended to give law enforcement, emergency medical personnel, auto companies and safety regulators a minimum set of mechanical measurements in the seconds leading up to and during a crash.

Under the new rules, auto recorders must track vehicle speed, acceleration, and deceleration, braking, steering and some air bag functions. In some cases data on vehicle roll angle, steering inputs, and passenger safety belt use will be recorded.

Privacy experts criticized the decision to use the owners' manual to notify consumers that the vehicle contains a recorder, arguing that many people do not look at it. They also raised concerns that data could be misused for legal or insurance purposes.

"They basically punted on the privacy issues," Jay Stanley, a privacy expert with the
American Civil Liberties Union, said of the NHTSA regulation. "This is a technology that is powerful and rapidly advancing and we need to bring our laws up to date."

Rae Tyson, a NHTSA spokesman, said the owner's manual is suitable for notifying consumers and stressed that recorder information is private property that cannot be downloaded without permission of the vehicle owner.

Tyson said most privacy concerns should be addressed by the courts and Congress, not by NHTSA.

OK, now lets take a look at some other technology that is in automobiles lately.

Consider "OnStar".

Using OnStar, in the event of airbag deployment, the computer uses a built-in cell phone in your car to automatically place a call on your behalf to the OnStar call center. If your car has GPS, the operator knows where you are to within 75 meters anywhere on planet earth. Like they show on the commercials, the operator can have a conversation with you to help determine your status and see if you need urgent medical assistance.

Using OnStar, you can place a call in the event of mechanical malfunction, and the operator can access the on-board computer to perform maintainence checks, so has direct access to this "black box" information as well as other information about your car's state.

Using OnStar, you can report that your car has been stolen and the car can be tracked like it has a "LoJack" via the cell phone system. Even more accurately if it has a GPS. Your car can be deactivated via remote control.

Using OnStar, you can lock your keys inside the car, call the OnStar call center, provide a "secret" password, and the operator can open your door locks via remote control.

Now look at the facts:

- There is a cell phone in your car, and it is not the cell phone you normally think of.
- It can be called by someone else outside of the normal cell phone number system i.e. it does not have a "telephone number". (The telephone number is just a reference to a lookup of the actual cell ID just like your IP is mapped to your ethernet MAC address.)
- This cell phone has data access to the internal computing network in your car (and yes, in modern cars there is a computer network.)
- This cell phone can issue commands to your automobile via remote control using an unknown authentication method.
- This cell phone has a microphone in the car so it can listen to you. (Its a hands free cell phone, in other words). This is important because of the automatic emergency call feature, without the mic, there would not be a way for an operator to determine if you were incapacitated in an accident.
- Under normal circumstances when there is a voice connection made, the computer disconnects the radio or other audio from the car speakers and connects the audio from the cell phone.
- All of these features are controlled by software. The total scope of this software is not known. These connections and features can be combined in new or novel ways (at least in principal) by reprogramming the computer.
- All of the software in modern vehicles is stored on "flash" memory so that it can be easily updated. Software updates as part of vehicle maintainence or recalls are common. One does not have to disassemble the vehicle to perform this update.

Now, given the above facts, what is to stop A Government Agency (AGA) from calling your car and without your knowledge, tracking you via your GPS and listening in to any conversations you might be having? Including any conversations you might be having on the "normal" hands free cell phone in your car?

Question: Since this is not a "telephone" (because it does not have a phone number like 1-202-456-1414), would this be wiretapping?

Now don't get me wrong, I like the "security" of my OnStar and the guidance ability of my GPS, its just that since I understand the underlying technology I naturally just assume that 1) "they" know where I am and 2) can listen in. Maybe they can't, maybe they don't care, but I don't discount it because "its impossible" because it is quite possible. All of the pieces are there, and that is simply a fact.

"Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose" because you have already given it all away.

 

[Vulcan59]

This technology as you rightly pointed out, has been available on most commercial aeroplanes as long as I can remember. It records not only the speed, altitude, etc of the aeroplane, but these days it also records which controls (pilot's or co-pilots) were touched, which radio was operated, and various other things. The newer aeroplanes trigger an alarm in the cockpit if nothing is touched after a certain lenght of time.

Apart from that, these "black boxes" have parameters set in them where, if the conditions required are met, (example a high rate of descent) it automatically starts recording and sends the data to the montoring station usually via satellite. This data collection and sending are done with no inputs from the pilots. Infact most often, the pilots themselves are not told what are the events that are been monitored. All they are told is that, yes data is been collected ostensibly for saftey reasons, like making training more effective.

Therefore I see no reason why it cannot be done through these newer generation mobile phones. Parameters can be set in this OnStar, where for example you cross a state boundry and that automatically triggers a report that is sent to whoever needs or is collecting that data. I suppose when they want to monitor and get information on someone, the PTB can easily obtain it and even eavesdrop on your private conversation, OSIT.

 

[rs]

Parameters can be set in this OnStar, where for example you cross a state boundry and that automatically triggers a report that is sent to whoever needs or is collecting that data.

This is already being done. While it does not use OnStar per se, car rental companies have a clause in their contract that you are not permitted to take the rental car across state lines or into another country, etc. They have secretly instrumented the car but don't tell you that not only are you agreeing to not cross state lines, they can prove whether or not you did. You are also agreeing to be law abiding, and if you speed, they can record this too.

People have returned rental cars only to face very high "fines" for violating the terms and conditions of the rental contract and this information came from these so-called black boxes.

While this is not exactly the same as my OnStar points, the general point remains that there is beginning to exist a lot of "instrumentation" ability in modern cars.

I need to also point out that it does not matter if you subscribe to OnStar, only that the hardware is actually in the car. If you do not subscribe to the service it only means that the OnStar call center will not answer your call. It might still be possible to perform the kind of tracking action I described regardless of your business relationship with the monitoring service.

There are other brand names of monitoring service beyond OnStar (a GM trademark) but the principal and underlying hardware is all the same.

 

[Vulcan59]

It's not only cars, what about the ubiquitous handphones? And also what's up with all these TV monitors that one finds in malls everywhere. And in Singapore, they even have what's called a TV mobile. These are your standard TVs with 15" to 17" screens that you can find on public buses. And also TV's in hospitals, private clinics, food courts, etc. And I am constantly amazed to find people on buses, subways, shopping malls, food courts, etc. completely engrossed in whatever the "stupid box" is showing. I also remember some discussion on cable TV in one of the threads.

Apart from monitoring, I wonder what else they can do with all that EM waves? Are they sending subliminal messages of "go to sleep, go to sleep, all is okay"??